


Like the Dead

by Anonymous



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Bucky Barnes Needs a Hug, Gen, Hurt Tony Stark, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Pre-Relationship, Protective Steve Rogers, They're all a mess, accidental injury, pre-fix it
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-19
Updated: 2018-02-19
Packaged: 2019-03-21 04:48:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 11,321
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13733478
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/
Summary: The moment Bucky's fist collided with Tony’s jaw all the noise had gone quiet.





	Like the Dead

Bucky felt cold dread overwhelm him the moment that it happened.  The moment his fist collided with Tony’s jaw he felt as though his heart stopped and fear froze him deep down to his bones.  A few seconds ago he had been annoyed, hadn’t even considered himself to be angry, at Tony’s constant rambling.  It was just talking, background noise because the man never shut up.

Bucky wasn’t even sure of what he said, just that it somehow either pissed him off or set something off in his head that made his body pivot and his metal arm to swing around.  Tony hadn’t even hit the ground yet.  Time was at a standstill, as frozen as Bucky felt.  The world had grown so cold and all he saw was Tony falling, not what state he was in or what he might be landing on.

Time all came back so suddenly he felt like he was going to throw up.  Tony hit the ground with a clunk.  The armor looked heavy, it looked like it was crushing him, but Bucky didn’t dare reach out to help.  He saw several parts of the armor tightening around Tony, helmet flying close and sealing around his head to hide it away.  The armor was shielding Tony, leaving his body inaccessible to surrounding threats.  Bucky dropped to his knees knowing the threat was him.

“Steve.”  Bucky whispered.

They were in some crumbled city in Kazakhstan, they were taking out a Hydra base that was trying to recreate Ultron from scrap they had found in Sokovia.  Bucky had insisted he was ready, he could handle the Hydra missions, and Tony had stayed by his side no matter how scattered the team got just to look out for him and make sure he was safe.

“Steve!”  Bucky shouted again.  The armor was moving, FRIDAY was wordlessly lifting the suit off the ground to get ready to take off.  If he hadn’t felt Tony’s jaw give way under his fist then Bucky would have thought that maybe Tony was fine.  Maybe he was getting ready to get back to the battle.  Maybe this would be something they laughed about later.  But the cold metal face of the armor was silent, Tony’s voice wasn’t rambling to bring it to life.

The armor flew, shooting up into the sky and heading north.  Bucky sat in the mud, watching the armor disappear until there was nothing left of it.  It was jarring, the whole world shifting in a single second.  One moment Tony was saying something and the next Bucky had slammed his metal fist into the guy’s jaw.  Bucky stared up at the sky until he heard footsteps, someone running quickly towards him.

“Buck, what?”  Steve said, coming up fast to where he was kneeling in the dirt.

Bucky stared back, looking at Steve’s face and just seeing panicked confusion.  Did he know what happened?  Was it obvious what had happened over the comms?  Did FRIDAY give the team an update on what happened?  Did he see the guilt in Bucky’s face?  Bucky couldn’t say a word.  He still felt so frozen as he looked around the forest, trying to find an enemy among the trees.  Where were the Hydra agents?  The robots they were trying to build?  Bucky desperately wished he wasn’t the only monster left here in the forest.

The team didn’t know.  The battle was won by the time Steve dragged Bucky back to the quinjet, they all looked at him with questioning eyes but then surprise when Steve told them Tony was injured and evacuated from the area by the suit.  They wanted answers.  Who had attacked them?  How was Tony injured?  Was he alright?

Bucky was frozen.  Trapped inside his head and he couldn’t break his silence to say a thing.  He didn’t know how to look these people in the eyes and tell them that he might have just killed Tony Stark.  Bucky let out a foul tasting laugh.  Of course that would be his legacy, the man who assassinated the entire Stark family.

Bucky leaned forward, tucking his head against his knees as he tried to breathe through the nausea.  A large hand settled on his back, rubbing small circles between his shoulder blades.  Steve was trying to comfort him.  Bucky would laugh at that if he could.  Steve who loved Bucky on quiet nights in the forties, with hushed whispers and private kisses.  The Steve who loved Tony in the twenty first century, all loud and overwhelmingly obvious that Bucky knew since the moment he woke up, even before he realized what it meant to him.  This Steve ran around the world for Bucky Barnes and this Steve sat outside of a workshop he no longer had access codes to with cold coffee as a peace offering, knowing he might never be allowed back in.

The sudden realization made him sick.  Steve rubbing his back, not even speaking, made it all so clear and it hurt so much.  If Bucky told the truth, if he lifted his head and told them all how one moment he had a thought where he just wished Tony would shut up, how he wasn’t even sure what Tony was talking about anymore, and the next moment he had slammed his metal fist so hard into Tony’s face that he was surprised his jaw didn’t come clean off.  Bucky realized that if he told them what had happened, Steve would defend him.  Steve would stand up and face the team and make every excuse imaginable.

Bucky wouldn’t be able to live with himself if he had to sit through that.

The suit had gone to Moscow, tracking the signal to a hospital in the city.  Bucky didn’t move from his seat, he didn’t get up to follow as Natasha and Clint darted out of their seats when the jet landed and ran out.  He didn’t say anything as Sam gave Steve a nod and followed after them.  Steve stayed with Bucky, but his body turning towards the exit in a silent wish to follow.  Bucky wished he would go.

“What happened out there?”  Steve said.  Bucky stared at him with wide eyes.  Steve had two voices, the commanding voice that gave out orders as if they were candy on Halloween, and the other voice was meek, terrified, like when he said Bucky’s name on the street after his mask had been ripped away.  Right now Steve had the second voice, no demands for answers, just horrified questions.

Bucky couldn’t utter a word.  His jaw was slack but his mouth refused to form a sound.  He still felt so cold.  His thoughts were racing, visions of Tony on the ground in front of him, wondering if it was brain damage or bleeding that killed him.  Tony at the very least had a broken jaw, perhaps he drowned in it.  He had killed Tony Stark.  His thoughts wouldn’t stop screaming that to him.

“Can we go inside, Buck?  Please?”  Steve said softly.  He was begging.  They were at the hospital and Steve was begging to run to Tony’s side.

Just another thing Bucky was guilty of.  He was dead and he couldn’t let Steve go to his side.  Steve would hate him when he found out what he did.  Bucky was surprised at how steady his legs were as he stood up and followed Steve off the jet.  Russia always seemed to be cold.

The hospital was bustling with people, police officers, UN officials, and the Avengers.  Something like this was considered an international incident, the hospital would be a target if it got out the Avengers were here and one of them was gravely injured.  An entire hallway was cleared out, no one but a few people knew which room Tony was in.

Bucky could admire the extent of the security went to, the preparedness that went into situations such as these.  Bucky and Steve were ushered into the closed off hallway and eventually into one of the many rooms where the rest of the team were waiting.  Natasha was talking to a doctor in quick Russian and Bucky had showed up in time to hear very few details.  Tony was alive and in surgery.  Alive.

“How is he?”  Steve asked, helping Bucky towards the chairs.

Natasha looked at the two of them for a moment, eyes dancing between them.  “How are things on your end?”  She said, ignoring the question.

Steve sighed.  He sounded tired.  “Something happened.  He hasn’t said a word about what it was.  Something bad happened just…we shouldn’t have let them split us up.”  Steve said quickly.

Bucky frowned and wiggled in his seat to try and find a comfortable position.  There wasn’t one.  Everyone was talking too fast, their tones made it seem like they all blamed themselves as if they could have somehow stopped it.  They didn’t know what he did.  He was entirely to blame and they didn’t know.

“I guess in the simpler terms, Tony’s jaw is broken, in multiple places.  And dislocated.  There is also a pretty nasty concussion but the doctors are sure Tony will survive, they just have to reconstruct his face.”  Natasha said.  She had her arms crossed over her chest, her feet apart to keep her balance stead.  Bucky saw her clenched jaw and tight shoulders and he knew she wanted to say more.  They were worried about him.  They didn’t know.

They were whispering to each other.  Sam, Natasha, and Steve.  For a moment Bucky wondered if they figured out what he had done.  Steve wouldn’t let them send him away, but maybe they would ask for him to wait in the quinjet.  But they hadn’t figured it out, Bucky hated the looks of concern they all gave him instead of looks of anger.  They should be angry.  Bucky would prefer it if they were.

He leaned back in his seat, staring up at the ceiling and breathing slowly.  It wasn’t difficult to block out the sound of their whispering just like it had been easy to block out Tony’s annoying rambling.  His eyes followed the pattern of tiles as he tried to pull up the memory, tried to focus on the incoherent mumbled of words Tony was saying to see if he could figure out what had set him off.  A leftover trigger maybe?  Something that would have slipped past Tony’s BARF tech and Wanda’s checks. Something not written down in that little red book.

Bucky looked at them.  The three of them whispering but they could have been shouting and Bucky still wouldn’t have heard them, it wouldn’t have changed a thing.  Steve ran his hands through his hair and gripped tight.  He was upset.  Steve loved Tony.  Bucky wasn’t angry, there was just a small bud of jealousy in the pit of his stomach and he never lingered on that feeling for long.  Not when he found Steve waiting outside of Tony’s workshop, not when Steve talked for hours about what Tony had done, what he said, what he wore, and how his smile looked.  Bucky doubted Steve even knew how in love he was.

Bucky wasn’t jealous of Tony.  He was jealous of the fact that he was some lingering memory on the outside of it all.  He felt like he had all of Steve’s love in the forties and somehow it had all been categorized as a memory, something so far in the past it was left behind.  That bud of jealousy only got worse, watered each time Steve left Tony’s side to see him, to defend him, to lean against him.  Bucky always thought they were in love again and was constantly reminded that they weren’t.  Steve wasn’t trying to win him back, he was trying to win Tony back.

And then Bucky hit him.

That didn’t sound like a reason though.  He and Tony, whenever they were alone together, never talked about Steve.  They talked about robots and bad sci-fi channel movies.  Bucky taught Tony to dance and Tony taught Bucky which planets in their solar system rained diamonds.  Tony had forgiven him, constantly telling him it wasn’t his fault.  Bucky didn’t hate Tony.  Bucky didn’t think a bad thing about him despite those small moments of jealousy.  Bucky would never dream of hitting Tony so hard over something so insignificant.

“James?”  Natasha said, kneeling down in front of him.  Bucky was thankful to be pulled out of his head.  There was only so many times he could ask himself why.  “We heard you two, over the comms.  You were talking, or Tony was talking, and then it sounded like you two were attacked.  Do you know who?  Can you tell us what happened?  Was it someone you knew?”

Her voice was oddly soft for an interrogation.  She genuinely didn’t know what he had done. Why hadn’t FRIDAY told them everything?  Bucky wanted to tell her.  He wanted to confess his sins, admit to what he had done.  They would know what to do to him, how to get whatever caused him to hit Tony out of his head.  They would hate him, but they would make sure it never happened again and that was most important.

Bucky couldn’t say a word.  He opened his mouth and all that came out was a soft and terrified grunt.  He was useless, he couldn’t even confess.  He just clenched his jaw and sealed his mouth shut, shaking his head.

They must have realized he was useless, turning away and sitting at different points of the room.  Natasha was facing the window and Steve the door.  Sam had just tucked himself into the corner.  They had sent a report back to the compound, updating the rest of the team about what had happened and Rhodes was already flying out.  There was nothing more to do besides wait for the doctors.

~~~

It took hours for them to get done reconstructing Tony’s face.  When they finally were allowed to see him in his room it was almost like he wasn’t the same person.  His face was swollen in some areas, deep bruises masking his complexion, the rest was covered in bandages.  He was so quiet, the machines that were helping him breathe were the loudest thing in the room.

Bucky was only allowed to stay for a few moments before Natasha ushered him from the room.  He was allowed to see Tony, see him alive and breathing and broken before she dragged him away.  He was going home to the compound, back to the United States since Tony worked so hard to get them pardoned.  Natasha had a gentle hand on his flesh arm as she brought him back to the jet to take him home.

They passed Rhodes in the hallway, he marched towards Tony with fire in his eyes and Bucky dropped his head as they went by.  Bucky sat in the back of the jet, buckling himself in and letting his head fall back against the seat.  Natasha would fly them home.  Bucky just wanted to go back to his room.  It would be quiet there.  He could lock himself in his room and let his panic consume him for a little while. 

Which was exactly what he did.  He ignored the inquiring looks of everyone on the compound and marched straight for his room, locking each lock on his door and then pressing himself as tight as he could into the corner.

He had almost killed Tony Stark.  Tony was in the hospital, his face broken and caved in and it needed to be reconstructed, and Bucky didn’t even know why he did it.  He had been stressed going on the mission, the threat of Hydra always bringing out the worst of his anxiety.  Usually he would take comfort in Tony’s ramblings, but with his nerves already on edge it had seemed grating at the time.  Bucky was annoyed, but hadn’t felt violent anger towards him.  It didn’t make sense, Bucky couldn’t figure it out; the stress of Hydra and Tony being annoying wasn’t enough to make him hurt someone like that.  Bucky usually had better control than that.  Something had snapped in his head and he lashed out at the closest person there. 

Natasha knocked on his door about an hour later.  She had brought mugs of cocoa and a half empty package of double stuff oreos.  James unlocked the door, waiting a few seconds as he calmed his breathing, and let her in.

“I didn’t think you would want to be alone.”  She said.

James sighed, returning to his spot in the corner.  He didn’t even try to speak anymore, something inside his chest had frozen solid and he couldn’t thaw it out.  He couldn’t manage a single word.  Silence had fallen over him and James decided it was his penance for what he had done, stripped of his chance to defend or redeem himself, leaving him in such a cold limbo.

“FRIDAY has locked us out of the suit’s footage.  She says it’s classified until Tony can review it.  I thought that was strange.”  Natasha said.  She dropped a few cookies into her cocoa and then held on in to soak for a few seconds.  James just held his mug in his hand and let the warmth sink into his palm.  “But then I figured it out.  Tony doesn’t trust us.  He doesn’t want us knowing anything about the suit in case we use it against him.”

There had to be a point to whatever she was trying to tell him, but it just made the guilt in his stomach grow heavier.  Tony hadn’t been wearing his helmet, he had taken it off once they were sure the battle was over and Tony detected no hostiles in the area.  He had flashed Bucky a big grin and opened his mouth to say…something.  Not wearing the helmet was a big weakness in the suit in that moment.  Tony shouldn’t have trusted him with that.

“So, what I’m saying is we have no idea what happened out there.  Which is our fault because Tony doesn’t trust us and so we’re locked out of certain information.  Which also means that we’re not functioning as a team.  Something like this should have never happened.  We have to make it right.”  Natasha said.  She fished out the oreos she had dropped in earlier, they were now mushy lumps instead of cookies but she still ate them.  “It’ll likely be a few days until Tony wakes up and he’ll probably be too drugged to say anything that makes sense.  Besides, his wired jaw means he can’t say anything at all.  I doubt he’ll even remember what happened.  So that means you’re the only one with answers.”

Bucky huffed a broken laugh and tightened his grip on his warm mug.  He wanted to tell her.  After doing something so horrible to a man who had done everything for him, someone who Steve loved, Bucky deserved to be punished.  He wanted them to know and crucify him.  He worried his reasons were entirely selfish, if he was punished for doing something bad to someone, then it wouldn’t weigh so heavy on his conscience.  Tony would come back and forgive him.  Steve would forgive him.  Bucky wouldn’t be cast out.

He didn’t say anything.

“James, whatever happened…you can tell me.  Was it someone you knew from Hydra?  Did they take you by surprise?”  She asked.

They were all so willing to believe someone else did this.  An enemy.  She didn’t even consider that he did this.  He loved Tony as well, had made it obvious even if he never said the words.  That hurt as well, watching Steve try to gain back whatever it was he had lost with Tony before, and Bucky was the ghost that appeared in the background.  No one considered him.

He had hoped Natasha would leave him alone once she realized he wasn’t going to say anything, but she stayed.  She stole a blanket off of his bed and made a small nest for herself.  Bucky sat on the bed for a while, watching her make herself comfortable in his space.  She turned off the light and promised she would be there in the morning if he needed her at all.

~~~

Once Tony was stable they brought him back to the US.  The Avengers Compound had a state of the art medical wing and they had made all the preparations to take over Tony’s care when he arrived.  He was still asleep, had only opened his eyes for a few moments during the flight but nothing substantial.  Tony had simply turned his head to the side and went back to sleep.  Steve talked about it excitedly as soon as he stepped into the compound instead of hello.

Bucky was relieved seeing Tony.  The swelling had gone down and his face was less bandaged.  He looked more like Tony now, with his goatee shaved off and replaced by massive amounts of bruising and stitches.  Bucky followed the unconscious man as they escorted him to the medical ward and got him settled. Antibiotics and pain killers given to him in carefully controlled dosages and the climate of the room regulated to the perfect temperature and humidity.  The room Tony was in was sterile and so clean he could see his reflection in every surface.  Bucky hated it.

He sat at Tony’s bedside for only a few minutes to confirm that he was alive.  Steve stayed as well, his hand holding Tony’s and he kept trying to tell Bucky about how relieved he was to be home and that Tony’s life wasn’t in danger.  Steve’s smile never reached his eyes.  His optimism was forced.  Natasha had already told Bucky that because of the concussion they feared brain damage, but they wouldn’t know the extent, if there was any at all, until Tony actually woke up.  Steve was in denial.  Bucky didn’t blame him.

He stood up, his hand lingering a moment as he desperately wished to reached out and touch Tony’s arm.  He wanted to make sure the man was still really here.  For as long as Bucky had known him, Tony had never been so still and so quiet.  The man looked close to death.  Bucky had no right to be here, he didn’t deserve the luxury of knowing he was alright.

“Barnes.”  Rhodes called out as Bucky’s path of retreat crossed through the common room.  Rhodes had a drink in hand.  “Come.  Sit with me.”

Bucky didn’t want to.  He wanted to run to his room and lock every lock.  He wanted to press into the corner and wait until Natasha brought him cocoa.  He would ask FRIDAY to turn the heat up in his room but he doubted she would.  She hadn’t been speaking to him the past few days.  She knew what had happened and her silent judgement was terrifying.

“I asked FRIDAY to show me the footage from the suit, see what had happened just so we can prepare for Hydra.  I even used my override codes, but FRIDAY insisted that it was locked to everyone, including me.  The last time Tony cut me out of information like that he was actively dying.  I didn’t notice it then but I notice it now.”  Rhodes said slowly.  He wasn’t drunk, but he was on his way there. “What she did tell me was that she had increased security around Tony’s room and had also increased surveillance monitoring for you.  Now why would she do that?”

Bucky picked a spot in the carpet and stared at it.  He couldn’t force out the confession that was bubbling up inside of him, but he prayed that Rhodes figured it out.  The man would get the armor and beat him, Bucky wouldn’t even raise an arm to stop him.  He deserved it.

“What happened out there?”  Rhodes asked again.

Bucky said nothing.  He heard the ice shifting against the glass as Rhodes took another drink.  His body tensed as Rhodes leaned forward and ran a hand over his face.  His gaze wasn’t accusatory, but it was demanding and Bucky couldn’t give him the answers he wanted.

“Nothing?”  Rhodes said.

After a slow, deep breath Bucky managed to look up into the man’s eyes.  He tried to will the answers out of himself. He wanted them to know what he had done. He wanted them to help him figure out why he had done it and punish him for it.

Rhodes sighed and shook his head.  “I’m sorry.  I’m just tired.  I didn’t meant to be an ass.”  Rhodes said, rubbing his hand over his face.  He coughed in an attempt to hide the shudder that went through his body.

Everyone seemed on edge.  Bucky couldn’t tell if it was just because Tony was hurt or because no one really knew what had happened.  It was likely a combination of both.  A teammate was hurt and no one knew how.  Half of their friend’s face was broken and needed to be surgically repaired.  It was scary. Bucky would probably be afraid too if hadn’t been the monster who did that to him.  Instead he felt nothing, but a constant panic.

Rhodes didn’t say anything more and so Bucky took the opportunity to flee back to his room and lock the doors.  Each click of the numerous locks on his doors made his heart skip a beat.  Tony was home now.  He was on the compound.  He was safe and alive.  Bucky just had to wait until he woke up.  He would get his answers then.  Tony would tell him what he had said that set him off and then they could get that trigger out of his head too.

Bucky pressed himself into the corner and tried to calm his rapid breathing.  He wondered if there had been no trigger at all.  Maybe he had just been pissed off and wanted the man to shut up and so he took matters into his own hands, driving a fist into his jaw with a mechanical arm and the strength of a super soldier.

~~~

Tony woke up often, though he never stayed awake long enough for people to ask questions.  Bucky had been there only once to see it happen.  Tony’s eyes, usually focused as a thousand brilliant things flowed through the man’s head, were hazy and narrowed in confusion.  Bucky had watched as Tony hummed, shifting in bed and then holding his hand in front of his face.  Tony looked at it for a moment before reaching to touch his face, fingers going into his mouth.  Bucky was frozen once again, watching in sick fascination as Tony, confused from pain killers and a head injury, tried to pry his broken jaw open.

Bucky didn’t move, but Steve did.  He reached out and grabbed Tony’s wrists.  It looked like it took no strength at all to get Tony’s hands back on the bed. It likely didn’t, Tony was too far gone to put up a fight.

“Sorry about that Buck.  He’s just confused, but he’s fine.  Honest.  Tony just needs more time to rest up and get his bearings.”  Steve had been insistent and blindly optimistic.

Bucky didn’t respond.  He wanted to ask Steve how Tony was doing the other times he woke up, but the words didn’t come and so he decided he didn’t really want to know.  He thought he could ask later when he was less startled, when the sight of Tony trying to force open his wired shut jaw was out of his mind.  Bucky wouldn’t see Steve again later. The man never left Tony’s side and Bucky decided he wasn’t going to come back here.

“Hey, are you okay?  You’ve been different since this happened.  Quiet.  We’re worried.”  Steve said.  There was something strange about his tone when he said the words ‘different’ and ‘worried’.  Bucky pushed forth a smile, wanting to reassure Steve that he was okay.  He was alive.  It felt like something more to add to Bucky’s list of sins, making people worry about him when Tony was lying in the medical ward.

Bucky kept smiling and he shrugged as he backed up towards the door, needing to escape the antiseptic smell and the far too quiet room.  No room with Tony Stark in it had a right to be so deathly silent. It didn’t sit right with him.

Before he could make it to his room to lock the doors and press himself into the corner he was intercepted.  Sam carelessly threw an arm over his shoulder and shifted his Bucky’s path, no longer going towards his room he was now heading outside.  Wanda was laying in the grass, Clint was napping in a hammock.  The air felt lighter the moment they stepped out of the compound.

“See, that’s what you need.  Too much time inside will make you sick.  It’s a nice day out.” Sam said.  He pushed his hands into his pockets and started down one of the paths around the compound.  Bucky hunched his shoulders and followed.

There were manmade ponds around the property, some with fish and others had fountains that shot the water high in the air.  Dozens of ducks sat near the water.  Bucky took a deep breath and tried to appreciate these moments of peace while they lasted.

“You don’t have to talk about it.  And the way things have been going I doubt youwill talk about it.”  Sam said.  He pulled out a ziplock back full of torn up bread and began tossing it to the ducks, who all ran for it and fought over the pieces.  “I’m guessing something happened between you and Tony, that’s why you’re taking his injury so hard.  Are you two fucking?”

Bucky flinched at the question, feeling the weight of the implications heavy on his body.  He had thought about it.  During the few moments when he and Tony had a few minutes alone together before someone, likely Steve, came to join them. He thought about sleeping with him when they spoke and Tony would lean in close.  When he would wave his hands in front of him as he talked, the same motions Bucky had seen him do when he was manipulating holograms in his workshop.

Steve loved Tony.  He had loved Bucky once, a long time ago.  Steve was trying so hard to win Tony back, to regain a spot in his favor, that Bucky couldn’t even dream of sleeping with Tony.  It wouldn’t just kill Steve, it would completely destroy him.

“So no fucking?  That’s a relief.  Makes things a bit easier.  Not such a huge mess, because right now Steve is…preoccupied with him.”  Sam said.  The ducks were crowding them now.  “But do you love him?”

A brief pause and then Bucky nodded.  He couldn’t even say that.  He had never said the words, but he did love Tony Stark.  The first time Bucky had realized he was in love was the third time he had seen him after the disaster of Siberia.  They had been pardoned at that point, Bucky wandered the silent halls of the compound to memorize the floor plan, the exits, the surrounding landscape, and anything else he needed to know.  Tony was up late, working on a cup of coffee while swaying on his feet.  Tony asked what he was doing up and Bucky had been honest with him, afraid of what might happen if he lied.  Blueprints of the compound appeared the next day. The layout of each wing and building, with the exception of Tony’s workshop.  That was a carefully guarded secret and Bucky didn’t ask about it.

There were a dozen times when Bucky realized he was in love with Tony.  He always forgot and then would realize it again with sudden awe.  Tony was a constant mystery that Bucky didn’t mind never having all the answers to.  Occasionally he would see something he hadn’t seen before, like the few freckles Tony had under his eyes and how he ate his sandwiches by eating around the edges to get the crust first, and suddenly realize how in love he was.  No wonder Steve was trying so hard to get Tony back.

“Steve wouldn’t be mad, you know.  This is just something you guys have in common.  Sure, it’s weird that you’re in love with his ex-boyfriend, who he is still madly in love with, but weird doesn’t mean a friendship ruining deal breaker.”  Sam said.  Bucky rolled his eyes at him.  “It’s just obvious you’re hurting and you don’t have to do it alone.  You can talk to us if you need to.”

Bucky turned around.  Sam had been following a path around the compound and Bucky had had enough of the outside. He was ready to return to his quiet, empty room alone.  It was always annoying when people tried to get him to talk, tried to reassure him that his feelings mattered and it would be better if he talked to his friends.  Bucky couldn’t, all words had dried up in his throat and now he didn’t even try to say anything.

He let out a relieved sigh at the click, click, click, click of his door locks.  He backed away from the door, staring at it for a moment before Bucky went to the window to close the curtains.  The room still felt off.  It wasn’t secure enough.  He wondered if it would be alarming if he purchased more locks for his door and installed them himself.  That was likely a red flag, especially since the team was already worried about his recent behavior. They would think he felt threatened, that whatever they assumed he saw out there to make him lose his senses was giving him paranoia.  He wasn’t locking his door to keep someone unknown anymore out, to keep him safe from all the monsters who tried to hurt them.  Bucky never locked his door to keep Hydra out. He locked his door to keep himself tucked away from everyone else.

Tony would tell him he worried too much, if he was here. If Tony wasn’t laying like a dead man, pale and silent, in a room on the other side of the compound.  Steve would tell him it wasn’t his fault, that he hadn’t meant what had happened and there was no reason to lock himself away.  Bucky would shake his head and pout until they left.  Bucky was certain this had to be done.  If the great Iron Man could seriously injured by a single punch then the general public didn’t stand a chance.  It was better if he stayed in his room, for everyone’s own good.

Bucky counted the minutes, waiting for something to change, for someone to come get him.  No one came. That was a relief, tension was building up inside again and he just wanted to be alone.  He didn’t want to accidentally hurt another teammate.  He held his breath, counting until he could release it.  If he could slow down his breathing he could slow down his rapid heartrate.  Then he could calm down.

Sometimes it got to a point where he just slipped out of his head.  He just pulled into himself, conscious of nothing but his breathing.  In and out.  Aware of each second in between.  In and out.  He would always lose count of how many breaths he had took but never of the seconds in between.  It was as close to meditating he would ever get and it did help in the short run.  It helped him separate from everyone else, to be alone with just the sound of his breathing.

 

~~~

Tony didn’t quite understand.  Steve was there, always sitting next to him and always smiling one of those soft smiles that Tony had missed so much.  He didn’t know why, he thought he and Steve were fighting.  Tony tried to open his mouth to ask if they were still fighting, if they were mad at one another, or if they had finally made up.  What were they fighting about?

“No.  No, Tony. Don’t do that.”  Steve said quickly, arms darting out to grab Tony’s hands that lingered near his face.  Tony pouted, humming at the tightness of his face, and tried to pull his hands back again.

Something was wrong.  Maybe they were still fighting, but it was hard to know because Tony couldn’t quite see clearly.  He felt the tightness in his face and knew that it was probably pain.  A lot of pain.  Pain coursing across his mouth and up to his temples, pounding through his head. He whined and tried to reach his hands up to touch it again, only for Steve to stop him.

“I know it’s scary, but you can’t open your mouth, don’t pull on it.  It won’t heal if you do.”  Steve said.  He once again pulled Tony’s hands from his face and down onto the blankets.  They were the itchy white blankets from medical, the kind that never seem to stay warm despite Tony constantly ordering new, different blankets.  He hated medical blankets.  He was starting to think it was the medical wing that made the blankets bad, and not the blankets being bad themselves.

He should leave medical.  He had warmer blankets in his office.  He should go there, he could get FRIDAY to turn the heat up and explain why his head felt so tight.  Pain, Tony reminded himself.  He pushed the bad blankets away, humming as he tried to slap away Steve’s hands, and shifted closer to the edge of the bed.  Steve kept trying to reach for him, his voice slow and soft as if Tony were a child and he had to explain things to him, but Tony didn’t bother to listen to the words past that tone.  Tony just kept slapping the hands away and humming as he pushed himself up.

His legs gave out on him the moment he tried to put weight on them.  Steve was there to catch him and stop him from hitting the ground.  Tony hummed loudly, his mouth refusing to open so that he could shout at him.  Steve was holding Tony against his chest and Tony hated it, he didn’t like it, and he pounded his hands against the man’s chest in anger.  He wanted to shout at Steve to let him go, to stop touching him.  They were mad at each other.  They were fighting.

Steve sat Tony back down on the bed and backed up, but Tony wanted to tell him to leave.  “I know this is confusing, but please just calm down.  It’ll make sense in a while.  Just lay back down, you still need rest.”  Steve said.  He looked tired, his eyes dark and his body slightly slumped.  Steve was always the pinnacle of health, but that meant if even the smallest thing was off, like him not sleeping, it was blatantly obvious.  Steve’s skin was paler than usual, almost tinged green. He looked awful.

“You’re at home, in the compound.  It’s the tenth of December, last week you were hurt on a mission.  Broke your jaw and got a nasty concussion.  You’re healing, slowly, and you’re usually only awake for about an hour or so and you’re always pretty confused.  You should lay back down and get some rest.” Steve said.  He ran a hand over his face and started to pull the bad blankets over Tony.

He was tired.  The energy that he had getting up and out of bed and disappeared entirely in such a short time.  He just laid on the mattress, wiggling against the pillow to try and get comfortable.  Real pain started to seep in to the tightness of his face.  He wrinkled his nose and hummed again, hands reaching up only to have them pulled away by Steve.  If he was badly injured then he would be on pain medications, which would be bad because those were usually addictive and Tony was an alcoholic.  He had written orders to not give him anything addictive, but the pain was so far away from good painkillers he started to worry.

He worried until he fell asleep.

When Tony opened his eyes he didn’t understand why Steve was sitting next to his bed with one of those soft smiles that Tony missed so much.  He didn’t get to see them much anymore.  Because they were fighting, weren’t they?

 

~~~

It took a while for things to start making sense.  Tony was sleeping often and he wasn’t allowed alone.  Steve was always there to pull his hands from his face when Tony wasn’t even aware enough to realize he was reaching up to it.  He couldn’t open his mouth.  He wanted to open his mouth.  He wanted to scream at Steve to let him open his mouth.

His jaw was cracked and broken, they let Tony see the xray.  Jagged lines on his lower jaw to show where the bone had broken to allow it to cave in on itself, squishing half of Tony’s face to one side.  He must have been hit with something hard.  Tony found himself wanting to laugh, because an unstoppable force seemed to meet his head as a very moveable, breakable object.  The laugh could barely push past his lips, it came out as a struggled breath that caused Steve’s gaze to fill with concern once more.

That was cause for a laugh anyway.  Steve, concerned for him.

Steve reached out to him and Tony pulled back.  He wasn’t as confused as he had been when he first started to wake up after his rather traumatic head injury.  Tony had already done the mental math, seeing if a shield aimed at his head could have done something like this to him.  It couldn’t.  The sharp end of the shield could have taken his head clean off if a super soldier used enough force.  The blunt end of the shield would have spread the force too wide, possibly crushing his entire skull.  Tony had thought about this a lot, even before his injury, and he concluded that Steve didn’t hurt him with his shield.

It didn’t do much to make him feel better.

Tony reached up and gingerly touched his hand to his cheek.  It ached, a dull and still far away pain.  Steve stood up, reached his hands out to stop him, and Tony pulled away with a grumble.  His face felt strange, he didn’t recognize it by touch, he hadn’t been allowed to look in a mirror just yet.  He desperately wanted to know what had happened to him.  No one was able to tell him and he wasn’t capable of asking.

“Maybe you should relax for now.  We shouldn’t get worked up.”  Steve said.  He tried reaching out to him to lean him back against the bed and Tony smacked at his hands, wanting him to get away.  Tony didn’t want to relax.  He didn’t know why he was here.  Steve shouldn’t be here with him.

Tony smacked Steve away and the men backed off.  It was such a childlike form of defense and Tony was simply relieved that Steve backed away.  Tony didn’t want to be touched right now.  He kept rubbing his cheek, his eyes scanning over the walls of medical, painted a soft warm color that was supposed to be calming.  He hated the xrays, wanted to tell them to take it down.  They didn’t have the answers he wanted.

 

~~~

 

Tony went along with all the testing and the doctors, despite how much he hated it, hated having himself examined and studied just to find out what was wrong with it.  He went along with it just this once.  He had a concussion.  There were worse things a head injury could do to him than just breaking his jaw and making him confused.

He went to physical therapy, not because Steve insisted but because he wanted to make sure his head healed correctly.  Tony couldn’t say as much, but he was terrified.  He wanted to get back to his lab, his workshop.  He wanted to make sure his hands still worked like they were supposed to and that his brain still knew how to create the things he created.  If he recognized his bots are not, if he could still work on the suit, if he could still be a superhero.

So he went to physical therapy to make sure his movements hadn’t been affected, he took their tests and did their brain scans.  He tried to be a model patient for the first time in his life, with Steve constantly lurking over his shoulder. Tony wanted him to leave, but the most he could do was move back and lean away from him.  He couldn’t tell him to leave.  Tony’s jaw was still sealed shut.

“This is good news.  Tony, this is great.”  Steve said.  The doctors were finally ready to determine that Tony had no lasting brain damage, if any at all.  It was definitely good news, it was like a weight lifting off of his chest so he could breathe easier again.

They were moving Tony from that awful room in medical back to his private apartment in the facility.  Back to the place where he wasn’t under constant medical watch and just had FRIDAY looking out for him.  Tony just wanted Steve to leave him alone.  He had been by Tony’s side since he had first woken up, only leaving when Rhodey threatened him.  Thank god for Rhodey, kicking Steve out the moment Tony walked into his own home again.  And for some strange reason, when staring Rhodey in the face, Steve didn’t argue.

“How are you feeling?”  Rhodey asked once the doors were shut tight.  Steve was gone, Tony was able to breathe.  “I’m sorry.  I’m just… I’ll stop by more.  Get him out of your hair. I just really want to find out who did this.”

Tony nodded.  He understood.  Rhodey was on the path of righteous revenge and so Tony was stuck with Steve as a babysitter.  Because he was injured, he couldn’t open his mouth to eat and he was still dizzy and confused, even from the short walk from medical to his own room.

“Do you remember what happened?”  Rhodey asked.

Tony shook his head.  He remembered a skype meeting with Pepper about expanding medical coverage for their factory workers.  It was an easy discussion, they were agreeing, the meeting had been a success and that’s the last thing Tony remembered.  The doctors insisted that was normal, that there wasn’t anything major to worry about if he didn’t quite remember the day he had a bad head injury.  Tony just clung to their recent assessment, no brain damage.

Rhodey let out a soft sigh, nodded, and gave Tony a soft look.  “FRIDAY locked us out of the video footage.  I understand that you want to make sure they can get into that stuff and look at it, but I need it. Just to figure it all out, okay?”

Tony hummed, nodding slowly.  No one was supposed to have access to the footage from his suit, no access to the systems reports, FRIDAY wasn’t supposed to tell anyone anything if something happens to him in it.  It was reckless and stupid, he didn’t think to get Rhodey clearance at the time, too shaken by Siberia.  The huge gash the shield left in the reactor, the dents in the helmet, and he wanted to make sure no one could find any flaws in his suit.  Tony didn’t know if it was justified or if it was pure paranoia at this point.

“If you wanted, I could call Happy, get him out here to make sure you’re okay.”  Rhodey said.  He was talking about Steve.  If Tony was uncomfortable, if he was scared of him, Happy was someone they all trusted to step between an injured Tony and a god damn supersoldier.  Tony didn’t want to put him in that position.

He shook his head.  He didn’t need it.

 

~~~

 

Tony slept a lot.  He would lay down for a nap and wake up the next morning.  FRIDAY told him when he woke up, nearly sixteen hours.  Tony blamed the medications, pills to help reduce the pain also made him so tired he slept the day away.  To his surprise Rhodey was still there, eyes dark and propped up in the nearby chair by his bed.

“Don’t call me a creep. I’m just here to keep an eye out.” Rhodey said.  He sighed, leaning back again the chair.  He hadn’t slept.  Tony could tell by the darkness under his eyes and the way he leaned a bit too far each time he moved.  “The facility is on lockdown. My order.  Do you really not remember what happened during that mission?”

Tony hesitated to answer, he didn’t remember, but judging on the look on Rhodey’s face it was bad.  He had seen Rhodes look like that a handful of times.  His face was set in stone, hard and cold.  He had stayed up the whole night to watch him and although he had done that a few times.  In college, when Tony was tired and upset and Rhodey was worried.  After his parents died, when Tony was heartbroken and desperate.  When he came back from Afghanistan, stayed up by Tony’s bedside the entire flight home.  Something serious had happened and Rhodey was on guard.

 “Barnes attacked you.”  He said.

Tony sat back, resting his weight on the headboard, and hummed.  He didn’t remember that.  Something as serious and ridiculous as that would have to be something to be remembered.  Especially since he woke up to Steve doting on him.  Steve, who would have chosen Bucky over everyone else in the world.  Steve had been insistent on standing by Tony’s side, harassing him and double checking he was okay.

Of course, Steve could just be doing all of that out of guilt.  He probably knew, had chosen to take Barnes’ side and was just now trying to ease his conscience or, which Tony thought more likely, was trying to lessen the inevitable fallout.

“Are you okay?”  Rhodey said, breaking the silence that had built up in the room.

Tony raised his eyebrows in surprise at the question.  His mouth refused to open, the wiring holding his jaw together had seemed to seal it shut quite well, and it hurt to even try to speak.  He wished he could remember what had happened because he could almost imagine it.  He didn’t know if he was to blame or if Barnes had snapped and attacked him, but he could close his eyes and see the Winter Solder slamming a metal fist into his head.

“Breathe slow for me, Tony.  I need you to stay with me.  Slow.  I’m here.”  Rhodey said, leaning in and grabbing Tony’s hand.  It was a strong grip, pulling him away from the fear spiral that was taking hold of him.  He didn’t remember it.  Why didn’t Steve say anything to him about it?

 

~~~

 

Bucky hadn’t tried to leave his room in a while, he couldn’t go out there and sit in silence as they all worried over Tony, knowing it was his fault.  He stared at his hands for a while, curling his fingers into fists and then releasing the grip.  He did it again, memorizing how his hands felt when they formed fists, feeling all of his muscles in one hand and all the gears and wires in the other, all moving when he told them to.

He didn’t notice right away that the building was on lockdown and he was secured in his room.  He had felt trapped for days, so becoming a prisoner in the room was almost unnoticeable. At first he blamed paranoia left over from Hydra, then he blamed his jittering nerves from the incident where he lost control with Tony, then he was fully aware that he was indeed locked in the room when he tried for the door and it wouldn’t budge.

Bucky took a deep breath.  Tony was awake now, Rhodey was focused on finding out who hurt him, and so it should have been an easy thing for them to find out what he did.  He stared at the door, knowing that it was his cell door that kept him locked up, a punishment that didn’t seem to lessen his guilt.

“The facility is under lockdown, Sargeant Barnes.  I would recommend you make yourself comfortable until the issue has been resolved.”  FRIDAY said softly, her voice sounding unconcerned by him.  She shouldn’t be concerned anyway, the monster had been found out and locked away.  Bucky wondered why she didn’t tell everyone sooner.

He should run away.  There was always an exit and he already had several planned out for himself.  Even in a futuristic facility that Tony built, there was still a way out and the AI couldn’t stop him entirely.  He sat down on the bed, watching the door with a growing sense of dread.  Perhaps the team was debating what to do with him now that the worst had happened, he had hurt a teammate.  They were out there, his judge and jury.

A few hours went by, James didn’t take his eyes off of the door.  His skin was crawling, he wanted to scratch his way out and run away until he was someone else somewhere else.  He didn’t want to be a prisoner because he hurt someone close to him.

When the waiting ended and someone finally came to him it was Natasha.  Bucky had been expecting Steve, who seemed to be the most attentive to him and no doubt would want to be the one to give him the news that he was being kicked off of the Avengers and sent somewhere else.

“Hi James.”  She said slowly, her voice surprisingly soft considering he was the enemy here.  “You probably already know what’s going on.  Do you want to explain it to me?”

Bucky stared at her, tension rising inside of him but he couldn’t seem to open his mouth and find the words.  Instead of becoming angry, his lack of a response seemed to make her more concerned.

“Was it a trigger?  Some Hydra agent say something to you and that’s why you can’t say something?  If whatever it is that made you attack Tony is keeping you from speaking then we can get someone in here to help you.”  She said quickly.  Her stance was defensive, her eyes focused on him, on every shift in position his body made.  She still saw him as dangerous. “Tony doesn’t remember a thing, he can’t help us clear you.  Did you attack him on purpose or not?”

She was demanding answers he didn’t have.  He felt like his memory was faded in that crucial moment where he went from walking alongside Tony to punching him in the face hard enough to break him.   She was hoping for an easy answer, sending the blame towards Hydra and working on fixing her two teammates.

Bucky shook his head.  He didn’t think it was on purpose, but at this point he wouldn’t seem surprised if it had been.  He didn’t know himself.

“Bucky, you have to say something.  Steve insists you’re innocent, but now that Tony’s awake we were granted access to the footage.  We saw it.”  She said.

He wanted to see the footage, he wanted to see himself as he did it.  Perhaps there was some clue in his eyes that gave it away, some hint to tell him why he did what he did.  Maybe he had been triggered, some Hydra agent said something that set him off.  Or he had listened to Tony’s never ending rambling and some part of his head decided to stop it.

Natasha sighed, pinching the bridge of her nose.  Bucky tried, he got the wheels in his head turning as his brain sorted through possible answers and he ground his teeth together to try to will himself out of his silence.

“I need to see it.”  He said, his voice sounded rough, gravelly from disuse and a nearly flat tone.  “The footage.”

He was proud of himself.  It was such a small thing to ask for the footage but after weeks of self-imposed silence it had nearly drained him of all of his energy.  It seemed like such a stupid reason to gain his voice for, a demand to see the footage of himself attacking Tony.

~~~

 

Bucky watched it again and again.  The suit had a lot of monitoring devices, scanning the environment to look for threats and read data and despite all the technology Tony created to keep himself safe in that suit it didn’t read Bucky, who walked next to him, as a threat.

Bucky watched, Natasha standing guard near the door, as Tony’s voice seemed to ramble, the two of them walking side by side through the woods.  Bucky was smiling in the video, obviously entertained by whatever he was saying.  Tony’s helmet had retracted to leave his head vulnerable but there were enough cameras to watch what was happening.

“To be fair this is like a walk in the park for you, isn’t it?  Of course, now you’re on the other side.”   Tony’s voice was calm through the speakers of the tablet, the video in such a high quality that Bucky heard the sound clearly.  For a moment, Bucky thought Tony had walked in and broken his own silence as well.

The Bucky on the video smiled fondly.  “Well, it’s a lot nicer fighting Hydra instead of for them.”

“Definitely, a nice change of pace.  Welcome back to the good side.”  Tony said it like a joke and judging by the video Bucky didn’t take it wrong.  He was still smiling.  He was laughing, and Tony kept talking.  He talked about the team, about training and tech and body armor, the normal kind of armor for the rest of them.  And then the Tony kind of armor that involved a full robot suit for himself and Rhodes, and even talk of one for Pepper, though she insisted she wasn’t joining the Avengers.

Bucky watched the video in its entirely as he and Tony made their way through the woods back towards the center of the action, the suit scanning the area constantly for any Hydra agents, and Bucky remembered being grateful that Tony had opted to walk with him instead of just flying off to get done faster.  As time went on Bucky grew quieter and quieter, he stopped offering jokes and commentary and Tony seemed to fill more of the silence with ease.

Then, after a while of walking, Bucky just stopped.  He stood there, eyebrows drawn together, he looked lost and confused.  Tony stepped closer to him, his mouth continuing to speak as he reached the gauntleted hand out to him, a movement that could be seen as either comforting or a threat as Tony’s palm, the repulsor, pointed at him.  The image of Bucky moved fast, body twisting to build momentum to throw a punch.  The video ended there.

He replayed it.

He couldn’t tell what was making him uncomfortable, he just saw the tension gradually build in his shoulders and his eyes turn wide as he seemed to recognize less and less of what was happening around him.  And Tony, who was the poor soul who had been closest to him, had stepped too close too fast and Bucky had attacked.

He replayed it again.

Everyone knew now, it got out and part of it felt good.  A weight had lifted off of him and after weeks of silence and guilt he was free.  He would be punished suitably for what had happened.  He sat there, replaying the video to watch himself smiling and joking, slowly going quiet and cold, his eyes drooping and his steps slowing.  Then he had to watch himself do it, Tony’s voice sounding confused and concerned as he walked up to him.

~~~

 

Steve sat in the hallway.  If he turned left he could go check on Bucky, see if he was in his head, if he had any answers, if he was okay.  If he turned right he could walk across the courtyard, breathe the fresh air until he entered the other wing of the building, and see how Tony was.  Maybe Tony was feeling clearer today, his pain meds and head injury being a bit easier on him today and Tony could communicate what he was thinking.  Rhodes was good at just reading him, not caring that the wiring on his jaw kept him silent.  Since his injury, Tony’s head hadn’t been as clear and his expression was far more open and expressive.

Steve didn’t pick either direction.  He breathed slow, twiddling his thumbs and waiting for the answer to come to him.  It didn’t.  Tony hadn’t remembered what had happened that day, always shaking his head whenever the doctors or other Avengers asked him.  Bucky hadn’t said a word.  The only two people who were there couldn’t shed any light on what happened and Steve was not ready to put all of his trust in a single video.

He lifted his head when he heard Natasha’s light footsteps.  He knew it was her before he saw her, only her footsteps were so quiet that even with his enhanced hearing he almost didn’t catch it.  She seemed calm, her face unguarded but also relaxed.

“Is he okay?”  Steve asked.

“He watched the video a few times, seemed a little confused as if he didn’t understand but he also wasn’t surprised.  He even spoke to me.”  She said, plopping down onto the floor with him.  She held her hand up when he opened his mouth, but he was desperate for news so he kept silent.  “He didn’t say much, just that he doesn’t know why he did it.  No Hydra agent, no Loki and scepter combo, no magic.  Just James and he doesn’t have a lot of answers.”

Steve’s expression pinched and he tried to shake his head.  “He remembers doing it?”

“To an extent.  He remembers some of what lead up to it, he remembers feeling himself doing it, and he remembers everything after.”  She said.  She spread her legs out in front of her and heaved a sigh.  “As far as any of us can tell, no outside influences.”

“Do you think he tried to kill Tony?  On purpose?”  Steve said.  He didn’t believe it, even as he asked the questions.  Natasha started shaking her head before he even finished.

“No.  Personally, I think something set him off.  It could have been the fight against hydra, a long term build up of stress, trauma, and Tony was just at the wrong place and decided to get too close to him and he reacted to a perceived threat.”  Natasha said.

It wasn’t an answer he wanted.  If someone had done something, if some outside force had done something to make Bucky do what he did then it would be easy to pin the blame somewhere else.  Now there was no one to blame, nothing to let his frustration out on, and he had to find a way to help Bucky and Tony after this all happened.

“It’s going to be fine.” Natasha said.

“No it’s not. The last thing we all needed was for Tony to hate Bucky more.”

“He doesn’t hate Bucky.”  She said.  Steve pinned her with a look.  It had been a while since the… incident in Siberia.  Time healed all wounds but Steve still felt like it had scarred over ugly and painful.  “Okay, he hated you more than he hated Bucky.  Tony’s an emotional person and has a bit of an explosive, self-destructive, and impulsive personality.  Watching a video of his father being beaten to death and his mother being strangled by the man standing next to him and finding out you lied about it to his face for years brought forth a bad reaction.  It was a mess, Tony took his grief out on the wrong people, and learned from it.  He doesn’t hate Bucky.”

“Oddly enough, none of that made me feel better.”

~~~

 

Tony was getting pretty sick of watching videos like this.  Luckily, this one seemed fine.  He watched it, processed it, and sorted through his feelings as he tried to move his thoughts through the pain killer riddled brain.  Hearing about Barnes attacking him was one thing, but actually seeing it happen was another.

Barnes didn’t seem like an aggressive monster, he didn’t have a wild, murderous look in his eyes, and the more Tony watched it the more it seemed that Barnes felt threatened, like a spooked cat in a cage and Tony was the one who reached out too fast and got swiped.

Rhodey sat by his side the whole time, staring on like a quiet, concerned guardian as Tony watched the video and analyzed it again and again.  Tony lifted a finger, waving it around a bit with furrowed brows, gesturing at the room, and facility, around him.

“Barnes is on lock down in his room.”  Rhodey said.

Tony shook his head, pointing downward to try and signal for this room.  Rhodey shook his head and crossed his arms.

“No, he’s not coming in here.”  Rhodey said.

Tony tried to pout, tried to look as stubborn and angry as possible with his broken and slightly misshapen jaw.  He felt like his lips weren’t moving correctly.  They stared at each other for a few minutes before the tension broken, Tony unable to hold such an awkward expression and instead felt his lips curl up into a smile.  A smile on him in this state must have been hilarious because Rhodey started chuckling.  It didn’t make it all better, but it made it easier.

“No!”  Rhodey said, shaking his head as he smiled.  Tony pointed down, gestured to the screen which was paused on Bucky’s face and pointed down again.  “I’m not letting him in here.  You can’t protect yourself right now and I don’t want to risk him doing something worse to you.”

Tony shook his head again, trying to twist his expression into something convincing.  His face didn’t quite feel like his anymore, it didn’t feel like he had control over it.  He just stared at Rhodey, never breaking eye contact, set on his mission to get what he wanted.

“Five minutes.  I want to be here and I want that spider kid here too, to web him up if he gets aggressive.”  Rhodey said, making the hand motions he had seen Peter do a million times in training sessions and in those funny videos.  “In fact, I want the whole team, no most of the team, there to chaperone.”

Tony nodded, willing to let Rhodey be excessive for whatever he thought necessary.  As long as Tony got to see Bucky, figure out what was going on with him, what was happening in his head.  Tony mostly wanted to see how he felt when he saw Bucky again.  He wanted to know if he would be afraid.

He pushed himself up, throwing the blanket off of him and trying to breathe so he wouldn’t get dizzy standing up.  Rhodey stood up and pushed him back down.

“It’s been an emotionally draining day, not right now.  Give it time.”  Rhodey said.  Tony tried pouting again but it had no effect.  No use, his broken smile was ignored and he felt his blankets being thrown over him again.  He was tired, but he didn’t like sleeping when things were left unfinished.  “Tomorrow, I promise.”


End file.
